Discrimination

The New Jersey Legislature re-introduced a bill which if it passes, will be the strongest pro-employee, anti-arbitration bill in the United States. While it is not yet the law, if it passes, it will tremendously help all victims of employment discrimination in New Jersey. Last year when the bill was introduced it did not pass, so it was re-introduced this year under a new number.

Currently, many employers try to coerce employees and job applicants to waive away their rights to a jury trial if they file a lawsuit alleging discrimination. Some employers will not hire any applicant who refuses to sign an arbitration-only clause which is part of the employment application.

On April 24, 2018, New Jersey’s Governor, Gov. Phil Murphy, signed what is being hailed as the most aggressive equal pay act in the United States. This is great news for

Persons have come to me who lost their job in an alleged a restructuring, where the employer told the employee that he/she was not really being terminated from their position, because the employee=s employment position was eliminated in a purported re-organization, so there was no longer work for the employee.

I have found in my practice that the excuse of a purported organization by the employer may be a subterfuge, a smoke-screen effort by the employer attempting to avoid a wrongful termination discrimination lawsuit.

There are numerous ways to prove when a "re-organization" argument is really a gimmick, an impostor maneuver ploy to deceive the terminated employee into not filing a discrimination lawsuit. I have successfully represented employees who have been let go in a so-called "restructuring" and have been successful in obtaining six figures settlements for public and private employees.

The race and sex of a person should not be a defining factor in whether someone is best qualified to perform the essential tasks of an employment position.

In New Jersey and some other jurisdictions, there is broader coverage for employees’ retaliation claims against employers thanks to one brave female railroad worker who stood up for her rights against her employer, a railroad company.

This is a story of how one brave blue-collar female railroad worker's claim changed the landscape of retaliation law. It is a story that does not get told enough. In it, is the account of how one female who complained about sex discrimination by her supervisor, and then was subsequently retaliated against by her employer, a railroad company, had her retaliation claim eventually reach the United States Supreme Court. In this matter, Burlington Northern & Santa Fe Ry.

Not all of an employee’s reports or complaints to a supervisor about the employer’s business practices that involve other employees are “protected activity”. If it is protected activity and the employer retaliates, the retaliation is illegal.

If an employee reports to a supervisor, that another employee is discriminating, or harassing him or creating a hostile work environment because of the employee’s protected class status, i.e., based on race, disability, age, etc., the reporting about the offending employee is a protected activity under the retaliation provision of the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination.

I frequently get asked when a pregnant woman requires time off from work because of her own serious medical condition related to her pregnancy, if she can also ask for additional leave to care for her newborn child. Both the federal statute, the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) and the New Jersey=s Family Leave Act (FLA) allow certain covered employees who work for certain qualified employers, i.e., employers who are covered under the statute, to take time off to care for certain family members under certain conditions.

The major difference between the statutes is that the federal statute, Family and Medical Leave Act, additionally allows an employee to take time off because of the same employee=s own serious health condition, when such serious health condition renders the employee unable to perform the function of his/her employment position.